


Can You Hear the Rain?

by orphan_account



Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: 1941, Angst, Canon Divergent, Dick's father, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, before the war, church, death warning, no onscreen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-04
Updated: 2019-04-04
Packaged: 2020-01-04 15:24:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18346391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: It's a rainy day in the autumn of 1941. Dick has just buried his father. Then Lewis Nixon wraps his Cadillac around a tree.





	Can You Hear the Rain?

The familiar oak pews felt cold and distant under his hands as he lifted himself up, walking slowly up the aisle. He’d gone to this church all his life, but now he didn’t see the modest vaulted ceiling, or the simple cross on the far wall. He vaguely registered the black and white pattern on the floor as he looked down, but his eyes fixated on the side of his dress shoes. 

“Dick.”

His head snapped up, and Ann’s face came into view. Ann looked a lot like him, with the same kind eyes and often hidden smile of Dick’s face. But her blonde hair was all her own, and her nose was delicate, more like her mother’s than Dick’s. “Ann.” 

“We’re going now,” Ann whispered. Dick and Ann were flanked by their uncles, and Dick made himself look down at the dark wood of his father’s casket. “Just walk beside me.” 

“Okay,” Dick said numbly. It felt wrong that the casket should occupy the same place that the baptism well did. If he thought about it harder, maybe there was poetry in the fact that life and death happened in the same spot, but Dick was too broken to be poetic. 

The warm August wind urged storm clouds to gather around the small cemetery as the casket was lowered into the ground. Ann dutifully held Dick’s hand through the blessing, and Dick didn’t know what he’d done to deserve her. 

“He is now with the Lord, and with his beloved wife,” the pastor ended. “May God bless them and guide their souls.”

Afterwards, Dick could only sit in the lounge next to the chapel, listening to all the stories of his father and mother, while Ann went around the room and thanked everyone for their support. He caught snippets of his aunt and uncle discussing the last few weeks of his life, and how the cancer had taken his mind. 

He heard his grandfather talking of the trips his parents had taken to Virginia when they’d first been married. “It was the happiest I’d ever seen him,” he said. 

Dick let a tear slip down his cheek. When Ann made to go to him, Dick almost jumped up and shook his head. 

 

He felt awful for walking out the church, for leaving Ann behind, and for running into the thunder that had begun to shake the Pennsylvanian countryside. He couldn’t stop the tears and choked off sobs that began to rack his chest, and he could do nothing besides run from the church, and let the tears be washed away by the rain. 

Dick walked for a long, long time. He kept his head down for fear of someone passing by to see him like this, though walking around in the rain had to seem crazy enough. No one would even notice his tears, he was already drenched. 

He came around a bend in the road. If he walked one way he’d eventually hit his high school, and if he walked the other way, he’d hit one of only two grocery stores in town. The grass was lush and the smell of rain would’ve lifted Dick’s spirits if he hadn’t already been in a spiral. He’d walked this road hundreds of times before, coming home from school. If he dipped into the woods beside the road, he’d run into the pond he spent most summers at. Now the trees just looked dark and imposing. 

Dick thought that he’d imagined the crashing sound that interrupted his thoughts. It was a violent noise, so unnatural in the world of green and brown that he’d gotten lost in. 

His heart hammered heavily in his chest, adrenaline coursing through him and making him tense. He hurriedly rounded the bend in the road, slipping on pebbles and rocks lodged in the dirt on the side of the asphalt. Somewhere, beneath his soaked body and panicked brain, he registered that something could be wrong, but at the moment his brain was joyous for a distraction. 

Through the hard rain, Dick could see a shiny black car with its front end wrapped around a tree. Smoke billowed up from the engine, and Dick squinted, trying to see moving figures. Real worry swept through his stomach then, and took over his legs as he ran the final yards to the wreck. 

The car was new, and it was beautiful. Dick saw the Cadillac moniker twisted and almost destroyed on the crumpled hood of the car, and he winced. When he came up on the driver’s side, he gasped. 

A man lay face up in the soggy dirt, the car door like an accordian next to him. Dick stood in frozen horror, and then the man sputtered to life. He rolled unceremoniously around in the muddy Earth, coughing and wiping water from his eyes. He had dark, black hair, tinged red from a small cut on his hairline. 

He jumped back when he realized he wasn’t alone. 

“For Christ’s sake! Announce yourself!” Well, at least Dick knew he was coherent. 

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Let me help. Take it easy,” Dick soothed as the man struggled into a sitting position. He knelt down in front of him and wiped at his hairline, trying to find the wound that was dribbling red down his face. 

“I’m fine,” he snapped, though he looked sorry for it a moment later. “Thanks.” 

“It might need stitches,” Dick said, prodding around. “Can’t tell in the rain.” 

“Great,” he said. He looked around for a moment, looking puzzled. “Where the hell am I, by the way?” 

Dick quirked his head, mild alarm bells ringing. “You’re in Lancaster.” 

“Right,” he said. “What state is that?” 

“Pennsylvania,” Dick said hurriedly. “Do you know who the president is?” 

“Roosevelt.” 

“Good.”

“You know my father helped get Ted elected.” 

Dick, who had been trying to figure out how to get this bleeding man to a hospital, snapped his head back down to the black haired man. “Ted?” 

“Yeah, well Theodore I guess is what we should call him,” he rambled. “Respect for the office and all that.” 

He looked up at Dick, patient and innocent, waiting for comprehension to click in his eyes. When it didn’t, he snorted with laughter. “I know I look rough, but how could amnesia erase thirty years of memories when I’ve only lived for twenty-five?” 

Dick’s brain skipped a beat. “You made a joke.”

“Yes,” he said. “Based on reality. My father did help get him elected.” 

“That’s,” he stuttered. “Not funny.” 

“Says you.” 

Dick stared, dumbfounded at his nonchalance. “You’ve got to get to a hospital. Can you walk?” 

“Of course I can,” he raised himself quickly, then stumbled back into the wrecked car. “Let me try again.” 

Dick’s mouth quirked. He watched as the man took one striding step forward. As he started going sideways, Dick reached a hand out, which he grabbed forcefully. By the time Dick realized what had happened, the man had slid half onto him, and they crashed into the mud. 

“I guess I should introduce myself if we’re going to be getting into situations like this,” he smirked down at Dick, who quickly glanced away. “I’m Lewis.” 

“Dick.” Lewis slid off him, and Dick finally heaved him onto his feet. 

“Where did you come from?” Lewis asked, looking around for a car Dick did not have. 

“Uhm, that way,” Dick said, pointing through the rain. “I was walking.” 

Lewis was only a foot or so away from Dick, and he narrowed his eyes, as if studying him. There was no noise except for the lulling rain. “Why do I get the feeling that you’re having a worse day than me?” 

It forced an unexpected chuckle from Dick’s lips, though it sounded slightly strangled and morbid. “I might be.” 

Lewis bit his lip. “Look, I’m sure I’m fine--” 

Dick shook his head and Lew’s voice died off. “I know where we can get a car.” 

 

Half an hour later, Dick was driving his old Ford truck through the rain. Lewis was holding an old rag up to his hairline, with his head lolling on the leather seat. “Still with me?” He called, trying to keep an edge out of his voice. 

“I can’t believe I did that to my Cadillac,” he mumbled, both hands now covering his face. “My poor baby.”

“Just be thankful you didn’t get wrapped around that tree,” Dick said. He wanted to ask just how it was that his Cadillac had become entangled with the tree, but he sensed it may have been more than the inclement weather. 

Lewis was jittery when they entered the hospital, and Dick had to gently guide him to the bench where the nurse was waiting patiently. “You’ll be fine.” 

“It’ll only be a few stitches, sweetie,” the nurse said. She was probably younger than the both of them, but she had a commanding presence that assuaged Lewis enough to sit down. 

“I don’t like needles,” he said, looking pointedly at Dick. Any thought of Dick leaving to give him privacy left his mind, and he took the chair next to Lewis. 

The cut was more jagged once it was clean, and Dick attempted to make his face neutral, so as not to upset Lewis more, who was already grimacing and gripping the bench. 

“My father is going to kill me,” he griped. 

“He’ll be glad you’re alright,” Dick said automatically. 

Lewis looked over at him, his pupils obscured slightly by his eyelashes. “I was drinking.” 

“You shouldn’t do that.” He should’ve been more reproachful, more scolding, but there was something in Lewis that made him want to forgive him for everything he’d ever done. 

He sat silently for the nurse as she finished patching Lewis up. 

Dick stayed close to Lew as he swayed out of the hospital. “You stay there. I’ll bring the truck around.” 

“Alright,” he said easily. 

Dick felt like a coddling mother, but continued on with his task, and pulled close to the curb so Lewis could pop in quickly. 

“So,” Lewis said about five minutes into the ride. “Where are we going?”   
Dick almost slammed on the brakes. “Oh.” 

“I mean I’ll go any way you want,” Lewis laughed. “Seeing as I don’t have a car anymore.” 

“Do you have anything you need to get from your car?” Dick rushed. “Insurance or something?” 

“No, I lost that.” 

“We can go back to my place,” Dick offered. “You can use my phone.” 

“Okay,” he said, with the same ease from earlier. He paused a moment. “So what’s up?” 

“Up?” 

“You said you might be having a worse day than me.” 

A flashing pain shot through Dick, and he focused on the road. His face got hot when he felt Lewis intently staring at him. He hadn’t lied earlier, so he supposed he shouldn’t now. “My father died. I walked away from the church after the funeral.” Dick thought it sounded dumb now, but he didn’t feel like trying to explain more. 

“That makes sense.” 

“What?” 

“Well, I mean now I know why your truck was at a church,” Lewis said. “And also why you were walking in the rain like someone who was trying to catch pneumonia.”

“I’m fine,” Dick said. He rounded onto his street. After college, he’d leased an apartment close to home. He quickly pulled into his parking spot. 

He flipped the lights on in his apartment. He’d always appreciated its warm glow and cozy carpeting, and now he was even happier to be somewhere stable and familiar. 

Dick turned and quirked his head. “Lew?” 

He was leaning heavily on the door frame. “I think I’m really tired.” 

“Why don’t you just have some water and lay down?” Dick went for Lew then, and pulled him to his red squashy couch. 

“I don’t want to keep you,” Lewis protested. 

“You’ve been a welcome distraction, actually,” Dick remarked, going to his kitchen for a glass of water. “Besides, you shouldn’t be going anywhere right now.” 

Lewis gulped down the water gratefully, and Dick laughed. “Let me get you some blankets.” There was no more protestations from Lewis while Dick went to the closet. 

He was almost asleep when Dick came back, but he managed to pull the comforter over him. Dick stuffed a pillow under his dark head. 

Lewis was asleep in less than 30 seconds. Dick sat on the ottoman next to him. He felt it was wrong, but he gently ran his finger across the stitches on Lew’s hairline. His dark hair was fully dry now, and it was so dark it was almost completely black. Dick saw one freckle on his face, a perfect black dot, and thought about the mess of freckles on his own face. 

Eventually, he left Lew’s side. With one last look, he turned off the lamp, and left Lewis to his dreams.

**Author's Note:**

> Honestly I could imagine them meeting for the first time in dozens of ways.


End file.
